THE PASTEUR TREATMENT [Translation of a letter from Dr. Roux,
of January 6th, 1930.] r" [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sin,—It seems to me perfectly useless to carry on a contro- versy concerning the preventive treatment against hydro- phobia after a bite. This has been universally applied for forty- five years, and it is obvious that were it not efficacious it would long since have been given up. The most competent authorities of all countries have ascertained its efficacy, and in 1886 an official British Commission, presided over by Sir James Paget and consisting of Lauder Brunton, Fleming, Sir Joseph Lister, Quain, Sir Henry Roscoe, Burdon Sanderson and Horsley as Secretary, in reporting the results of their in- vestigations to the House of Commons, wrote : " It would be difficult to overestimate the usefulness of this discovery, both on account of its practical aspects, and its applications to general pathology."
I hope the readers of the Spectator will not hesitate between the conclusions adopted by English Authorities, after pro- longed experiments, backed by inquiries from persons who had undergone the treatment, and the fanciful assertions of Mr. Arnold Lupton, who attempts to revive a suit upon which final judgment has been passed.
Mr. Lupton shows his complete ignorance of the subject
he has tackled : his figures are inaccurate. Since 1887 the statistics are published in the Pasteur Institute Annals, with full particulars of the persons bitten, as well as the biting animals. Obviously Mr. Lupton has not read them.
My object in writing to the Spectator was simply to put the readers of this periodical on their guard against the assertions of Mr. Lupton : this having been accomplished, I consider that I have done my duty towards the public.
(Signed) Dn. Roux (Foreign Member of the Royal Society). Pasteur Institute, Paris.
[This correspondence is now elosed.—En. Spectator.]
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